The Man of Bronze by James Alan Gardner

to keep his arms raised. Soon he let his hands drop and clutched them to his broken rib. I tried to help but he pushed me away and continued forward.
    When he reached the steel slabs, he placed his palm flat on a slight indentation in one of the gates—a concealed fingerprint scanner. Five seconds passed. Then the gates swung back, softly scraping the top layer of snow.
    “Leave the car,” Reuben told me. “Someone will come for it.”
    “Someone with horns and a pitchfork?”
    “Don’t be silly, Lara. The Order are . . .”
    He stopped. I waited for him to finish his sentence, then realized he was about to fall over. He’d put up a brave front, but his energy was exhausted. If I hadn’t caught him, he’d have toppled face forward onto the road.
    I draped Reuben’s arm over my shoulders and walked him into the monastery grounds. His breath was ragged with panting; he moved in a semiconscious daze. I let him lean most of his weight on me, and scanned the area in search of anything that might be a medical facility.
    Despite Reuben’s acting as if people were watching our every move, St. Bernward’s appeared deserted. Not a light, not a sound, not a sign of life—nothing but buildings of silent stone, draped with wintry shadows. Our breaths steamed. No one came to greet us or to offer Reuben a hand. After a few moments, I started forward again, ready to kick down doors if that’s what it took to get Reuben some help.
    There were more than a dozen buildings within the monastery’s walls. Most were stone huts—not for people to live in but for the many functions a medieval monastery once performed. There’d be a hut for drying herbs, another for blacksmithing, another for curing leather, and so on.
    Four larger buildings were arranged in a square around a central courtyard. One had the look of a chapel, with a round stained-glass window above the entrance doors. The other three had no identifying marks: just chunky two-story buildings made of stone, with narrow windows cut grudgingly into the walls. Those buildings would house the monks and nuns, and provide the usual amenities of cloistered life—a kitchen, a refectory, a library. They might also contain an infirmary . . . so I guided Reuben toward the courtyard. When we got near enough, I called, “There’s an injured man here! He needs help!”
    Light appeared in the entrance of one of the three anonymous stone buildings: an oil lamp in the hand of a man wearing the black robes of a Dominican monk. He was in his sixties, with short-cropped gray hair and a lean leathery face. His vision was obviously diminished with age because he squinted into the darkness several seconds before spotting us; then he stared disapprovingly for a count of ten before beckoning us inside.
    As I propelled Reuben forward, the monk’s gaze dropped to the blood-soaked bandages on Reuben’s ribs. The man’s expression tightened. He stepped back so Reuben and I could get through the doorway. “Down here,” he said, leading us along a corridor of damp stone. Twenty paces later, he stopped at a closed wooden door, tapped once, then opened it.
    My eyes were flooded with electric light . . . not abnormally bright, but after all the darkness, I was temporarily blinded. Someone eased Reuben’s arm off my shoulder. Two dark figures escorted him away and helped him onto a flat surface. As my vision returned, I took in my surroundings: a modern treatment room, as good as Jacek’s or better. The temperature was cozy. Two women in their twenties—twins, Japanese, wearing dark brown habits in the style of Zen nuns—stood on either side of Reuben where he lay on an examining table. One woman removed his bandages while the other pressed a stethoscope against his chest.
    “Kaisho and Myoko are licensed doctors,” said the Dominican monk. His accent sounded Germanic . . . maybe Austrian or Swiss. He stared at me a moment, sizing me up. “I’m Father Emil. You’re Lara